Moto G sees largest sales in the history of Motorola

We were pretty impressed when we reviewed the Moto G back in December last year. Although it’s not the best performing handset on the market, in terms of value for money the Moto G can’t be beaten, and it seems that consumers also agree. The Moto G has now become Motorola’s biggest selling smartphone in the company’s entire history.

In an interview with dnaindia, Motorola Vice President Magnus Ahlqvist revealed that India has been the driving force behind the Moto G’s success. Although the company can’t comment on the actual sales figures at this time, the handset has “far exceeded” Motorola’s initial expectations. For a company that was looking down and out not too long ago, Motorola seems to have turned itself around very quickly. I’m sure Lenovo is feeling pretty happy with its purchase right now.

But there are quite a few budget handsets on the market too, so what made the Moto G particularly successful?

How did Motorola accomplish this feat?

For starters, the Moto G is a product pretty well suited to the Indian market, where consumers are interested in a premium experience at an affordable price point. As we all know, the Moto G offers an excellent balance of price and performance, giving it a strong start in the Indian market.

But perhaps equally as important to the handset’s success was the sales strategy. Rather than releasing the handset to multiple carriers and multiple stores, Motorola decided to pursue an online-only sales strategy, pairing up exclusively with the Indian e-commerce supermarket, Flipkart.

it is safe to say the sales of Moto G have far exceeded Motorola’s, as well as Flipkart’s wildest expectations. In fact, Moto G has seen the largest sales ever in the history of Motorola

This strategy allowed Motorola not only to get the device into consumers hands cheaper than it would have done by distributing handsets out to multiple parties, but by working with such a larger partner in an online environment, the company still manage to reach a wide number of consumers.

As part of Motorloa’s India strategy, the company also set up 100 walk-in service centres in the months leading up to the launch, eliminating consumer worries about ordering products from the internet, where customer service can often be a difficult and frustrating process.

the Motorola brand in India is amongst the strongest in the world.

Looking to the future, in India Motorola will be continuing its relationship with Flipkart for the next two quarters, and is investing a lot in its own service network for the longer term. The smartphone developer is also on the lookout for other partners, and is already in talks with telcos for some sort of deal in the next 6-18 months. So would a similar strategy work out so well in other markets, such as Europe and the US?

Nexus and Google Edition devices are sold in a similar way, but they’re not really targeted at the mass consumer in the same way that the Moto G was. Whilst we all consider ourselves clued up on the ins-and-outs of the smartphone industry, the same can’t be said for the average consumer in the same way that it canould be about the Indian market. For that reason more than any other, perhaps the Moto G’s success can’t be so easily replicated over here.

We’ll probably see similar ideas in the future, but it’s doubtful that online-only sales partnerships will ever become the norm. Would you like to see more exclusive, cheaper, online-only offers in your home countries, or does the current setup work best for you?